TMNT Rehab
by mysteryred
Summary: Leonardo after a brief stint in rehab. AU: Mutants are citizens. One-shot written for a Fic contest (subject was Rehabilitation & had to be an AU). Update: Rehab took 4th place! Nominated for 2015 Stealthy Stories Fanfic Comp in Best Leonardo category.


Under the Bridge  
I drive on her streets  
'Cause she's my companion  
I walk through her hills  
'Cause she knows who I am  
She sees my good deeds  
And she kisses me windy  
I never worry  
Now that is a lie  
~Red Hot Chili Peppers~

Black ink smudges my thick green fingers as I rub the paper trapped between them. That's all this is, another stain on my career. I place the paper on the circular kitchen table, brushing the headline one more time. I glance at the badge and bottle of pills resting near my wallet on the counter and heave a sigh.

 _Sergeant Leonardo Hamato Reinstated after Rehab Stint_

As I reach for the tea kettle I feel a twinge in my gut. Desire blossoms throughout until it reaches my fingers and they curl around the handle of my teacup, snapping it off, allowing it to shatter in tiny ceramic shards, scattering across the floor in different directions just like my life.

It's the very same yearning that earned me a trip to rehab in the first place. It's a terrible mix, of guilt, shame, mistakes paid with too heavy a price, an endless struggle to survive, even now. I have a never ending responsibility to protect and guide my team, my force, my family. It's the weight of my life before, and the adjustment to my life after becoming a citizen that's presented me, and my family, new challenges. The very trials that provoked my father's instincts to keep us hidden in the first place, they'd come to pass when mutants were first granted citizenship. I'd done my best to keep us safe, while trying to navigate our new lives, in the light.

Some lights are just too bright. I stared at the tiny fragments, wondering briefly if I could pick up the broken pieces of me. As I reached for the dustpan, sweeping the shards up, discarding them in the trash, I felt the draw again and wondered if I should've stayed longer. No, I've got this. I just need… I looked around me, at the humble apartment, threadbare carpet, plain white walls, the worn plaid couch with the dip in the cushion where Raph liked to sit. My coffee table was bare of magazines, a single clock hung on the wall near the front door, a picture of my family above the couch.

A breath caught in my throat to look at the picture of us, to think of when we still lived together, when they were easier to protect. When I could still sleep at night, not lying in bed wide-eyed and skin crawling, eager to go check on them in their respective homes.

There was one thing that offered me some comfort amidst my newfound physical loneliness. I made my way toward the living room window, pushed up the peeling wooden sash, climbed onto the creaking metal fire escape and made my way to the roof. I was familiar with emotional loneliness, I'd carried that sensation with me most of my life. My brothers never understood what it meant to be a leader, not really. It's the job Raph wanted, that Mikey looked up to, that Donnie could've filled, but never reached for, satisfied with his tinkering and creations.

The wind whipped around me, blowing the cobalt tails of my mask, tugging them back as if pulling me further from the edge. I followed that draw to the center of the tar coated surface, near a utility closet. Leaning against the brick side, I slid my shell down and came to sit, staring up at a heavily overcast charcoal sky, illuminated with the radiant golden lights seeming to frame the square and triangle shapes of every skyscraper. There's a thrumming to my heart that matches the rhythm of the cars buzzing along the streets below, I can feel the energy of the people whose shoes scuff the pavement, hear their curses amid a few excuse me's. She breathes, this city, and I can sense her, like Mikey can a pizza within a five mile radius. The corners of my mouth tip upward slightly, but my heart still aches.

Leadership is something that came naturally to me, to take charge, to organize, to plan, direct. I needed some fraction, some semblance of order, if I could just control everything then I could keep it together, keep us safe. But life didn't work that way. At least when we lived together I could count heads at the end of the day, assess the damage, and make adjustments… When my brothers wanted their own places, I began to unravel. Then there was my job, on the force, my team there, I had to keep them safe too. The pressure was building, mounting, the burden was vast, an iron weight bound to my shoulders. Slowly, I began to crumble beneath it.

Habits. I began cleaning everything, spotless, placing each and every item smoothly in place, my silverware, my towels, my shoes, my toothbrush, the cap on the paste. My phone, my keys, everything had a place. Bleach, became my friend, sanitize the countertops, the bathrooms, the toilets. Training took up my spare time, and after it my swords had to be sharpened and polished, my padding scrubbed. Then I had shopping, the cashier mixed my meats and dairy one too many times, so I started bagging the items myself. My desk at work, my paperwork was flawless, my pencils in their cup, the surface tidy. I did everything I could to control anything still within my grasp, seeking some semblance of comfort, some familiarity. If I wasn't working, or training, I was cleaning… or calling them, to see if they were alright. And when they didn't answer, well I went looking for them. I wince at the memories…

Mikey was easy, I just ordered a pizza from his parlor every night for dinner. I got to see him, he was there, and he usually went home right after. I know because when his shift ended at midnight every night, I followed him, to be sure he got there safely.

Donnie wasn't too difficult either. He was either at the lab he worked for, or home with April. I'd taken to sending him a text asking when he got off work. When he wised up to that, I began texting April, and she didn't mind telling me.

Raph, well that wasn't easy when we lived together, and it was worse now. Some nights I couldn't find him. When that happened I went home and paced, stared at the ceiling, tossed and turned in bed, got up and paced some more. Of the three, he was the one most likely to get himself in a situation, and I feared getting a phone call at some unacceptable hour of the night telling me something had happened to him. He took to deliberately not holding a pattern so I struggled to track him. Just like when we were kids, he didn't understand. I needed to be sure they were safe, that was my job, my purpose, they were my life.

 _"What the hell are you doing Leo? Stop following me everywhere. Go home, go get drunk, get a life, do somethin' that ain't followin' me."_

It never bothered me when he ran his mouth. I could ignore that, and I could manage a fight between us. What I couldn't stand was when I couldn't keep tabs on him. He'd never know how many times I'd been under the scrutiny of our father because of something he'd done that I'd not been there to stop.

Before long I found my sleepless nights wearing me thin, literally. I lost weight, my eyes had circles under them, my body grew heavy, my footsteps arduous. Then I messed up and that was one headline that I bore willingly. It was my slip up, mine, and I was honorable enough to own up to my mistake. The words blazed through my head like a star piercing the smog filled skyline.

 _Rookie officer killed in bank robbery, Sergeant Hamato ordered attack, suspended pending investigation…_

That kid should've never gone in there. I should've never ordered him in. I knew better. I was falling apart, trying to control too much. But it wasn't a bottle, or a needle that I reached for, it was sleep. I just wanted to rest, to stop thinking, stop worrying. When I visited a doctor she prescribed something to help. At first it worked, but gradually they weren't as effective anymore, so I started taking more at a time. After a while that didn't work and I began taking one a couple of hours before I'd take the others. Then one night…

 _"Hey, Leo, I brought you a pizza. Haven't seen you tailing me when I get off work lately, thought I'd come by and say hi. Leo? Leo?"_

I could hear Mikey, but I couldn't answer him through the fog that blurred my mind. There was a murky image of him in my head, his voice seemed far away, and my eyelids were just stuck shut, not lifting when I summoned them. My plastron was heavy too, it did not rise and fall of its own accord, it was by my will, that I forced in and out breaths through the immense weight pressing upon my slowly thumping heart. Mikey continued to speak, I think I moaned, at least I tried to. There were sirens, I was lifted, moved, bounced, poked, puked… I slept. Then there was rehab.

The first week had been weaning me off the sleep aide. That involved me randomly biting people's heads off before I realized I'd opened my mouth. Since I _never_ do that, what should have been the second sign that I was losing control (the first being that I was even in rehab), is what finally made me realize, I had a problem. I was furious that the department required me to complete treatment if I wanted to keep my job. I was livid with Mikey for having called an ambulance. I was disgusted with myself for becoming dependent on a drug to help me sleep. I was supposed to be cool, calm, collect, in control at all times. Yet the tighter I had pulled the strings the harder it became to keep them bound, and they'd frayed long before they snapped.

Once I'd made it through cleansing my body, riding the wave of low blood pressure, a cloudy head, and emotional instability, I found myself in group counseling. There I was listening to people talk about what brought them to where we were. All the while I was thinking my life was so much darker than the darkest places they'd seen. Only it wasn't anymore, my life was brilliant beneath the rays of the sun and I was blinded by it. I'd coped better with my small dark world than I'd handled adjusting to one where light reflected off of damn near everything. I felt, exposed. That's what I'd said. Exposed. And they'd all looked at me like I was the most ungrateful creature they'd ever laid eyes on. Was I complaining about the very thing so many had lain down their lives for? Freedom?

Regardless, I'd made it through the program. I had my job back. And here I was, alone again. Only this time I wasn't pursuing my brothers. They were adults, they could handle themselves. They could handle themselves. They could… The truth was, letting go, it was painful, like tearing off a Band-Aid when it had been on too long and refused to free your flesh from its binding. I'd made the decision to just rip it off, that habit, tossing it away with the wind.

The very wind whipping across my face right now. The city was where I'd found some peace, in the night, it brought my reprieve. That was when I could fall back on what I knew best, what I understood, the shadows. The city spoke to me at night, as I made my way over her rooftops, for old times sake as much as anything. I felt free for a while, running and leaping, pushing myself forward, not looking back, the cement silent beneath my bare feet, katana gleaming in the moonlight, air floating across my damp flesh. The metal of fire escapes would groan beneath my weight, while my landings themselves were mute. It was the city, the night, that saved me, blessed me with the freedom I so desperately sought. She knew, the city, what I'd done. She saw, those we'd saved from our burden, the darkness. Her alley ways cried with all they had seen. And we'd heard her call. I still heard her. Maybe that's why I still couldn't sleep at night. Why I'd given up fighting for slumber, and decided, I would continue to answer her.


End file.
